Flour Hour
by BespectacledSloth
Summary: Tadashi and Honey Lemon bake a cake! (Really poorly-written fluff piece for romance-writing practice!) TadaHoney!


As a note, this is not a Tadashi!Lives fic, nor is it a Pre!Movie fic. It's just a fic. I envisioned this is as Hiro's 15th/16th birthday, but see what you will of it.

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><p>Tadashi stared at the ingredients in front of him. Milk, eggs, sugar, chocolate chips, cocoa powder, flour, and an entire menagerie of other items that he had no idea how to combine properly. Sure, he could build a robot from scratch, but baking was an entirely different skillset that he didn't possess. Having to get precise measurements of items and mix them a particular way with cooking for a certain amount of time was difficult enough when making an omelet or pizza, but with baking it was that and so much more, because if some things weren't mixed or cooked properly, every scrap of work would be a waste.<p>

Unfortunately, it was up to Tadashi to bake Hiro's birthday cake. Aunt Cass had planned for the party to be late in the afternoon and she'd forgotten to pick up some decorations and a couple of presents, so she'd gone out for the afternoon and left the task entirely up to him. She probably hadn't realized that the most contact he'd ever had with a cake was when he was eating it.

He pulled out his phone, desperate for help, and chose the only person he knew would know how to combine ingredients _just so_. "Hey," he said when the person on the other end picked up, "I need your help. It's an emergency."

Honey Lemon came bursting in through the cafe doors and stormed her way to the kitchen within a half hour. In that time, Tadashi had managed to move the ingredients from the counter near the sink to the counter by the stove and arranged them into a frowning face. He looked up when she came in and smiled.

"You made it!"

"You said it was an emergency so I just thought I'd, you know, run through the rain to catch the train on time to make it here as soon as I could," she looked a little frazzled, she wasn't even wearing her signature heels that made her so tall. Instead she was wearing a pair of quickly-slid-on flats that made her just barely taller than Tadashi, instead of her near head-higher height that she usually stood at. She had a bit of anger in her step as she marched to the closest counter and put her bag down, but as soon as she pulled out a hair tie and began fixing her hair, Tadashi knew she had calmed down enough for him to explain himself.

"Aunt Cass put me in charge of baking Hiro's birthday cake," he said.

"Say no more," she pulled her long hair into a high bun and turned to him, pulling an apron off the hooks by the kitchen door and folding it in half before tying it around her waist, "When do we need to be done?"

He grinned and looked at the clock, "We have four hours. I think we'll be okay."

"Maybe. Let's get started. You preheat the oven, I'll get the bowls and mixers," and they set about setting the kitchen up so that they could smoothly transition between stations. One station had bowls and hand mixers, while another had an automatic mixer specifically for making the frosting, and so on all the way around to the sink where everything would be deposited and cleaned before the party.

"Okay, first I need the salt, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa and flour," she looked at him expectantly, "Well come on, I'm not going to do this by myself. I'll show you how to do it so next time it won't be an _emergency_," she pulled her phone out and took a picture of herself in front of the ingredients then turned, "So, flour, salt, sugar, etc."

Tadashi slid the ingredients down the counter to her and they both began scooping out the appropriate measurements into the big bowl in front of them, leaning over each other and grabbing bags and measuring spoons and cups as they went until the bowl was filled with what they needed.

"Now milk, eggs, oil, and vanilla, boiling water. Hand me the mixer too," they chatted quietly about school and this and that while they worked until Honey switched the mixer on and the sound filled the air, making talking nearly impossible without shouting over the ruckus.

As she stirred the bowl, Honey noticed that the mixer was flinging bits of batter out and nearly dropped the mixer when a large splatter flew off and landed on her cheek. She switched the mixer off and stepped back, looking at Tadashi, "This isn't working," she said with a small laugh.

He laughed as well and picked up a paper towel, gently wiping the batter off her cheek, "The mess is fine, we can clean it up when we're done. Aunt Cass won't mind if we don't get to it until after the party either."

Honey looked at the batter that had landed on the counter and walls, feeling like she should clean it up, but instead shrugged and continued mixing, flinging more batter on herself and all around. Luckily the measurements they'd used would yield a fraction more than they needed, so the loss wasn't entirely cake-ruining. She put the mixer down when she was done and ran over the directions she had in her head.

"Now we need to grease the pan and bake, and when that's done layer one will be finished."

"Layer one?"

"Oh, yeah, the cakes I make are always three or more layers, so we're making layer cake," she grinned, "So let's get this in the oven and we can start layer number two!" She carried the bowl to the stove and greased the cake pan before pouring the batter in slowly and smoothing it out, then she stuck it in the oven, set the timer for ten minutes, and went back to the first station with a clean bowl, the original bowl discarded in the sink.

She started gathering the first ingredients again, and when she was half done putting the powder ingredients together, she stepped to reach for the flour and slipped on a bit of egg that had gotten on the flour. One hand on the bag of flour, the other on the counter, she only fell to her knees, but pulled the flour right to the edge and dumped half of it onto herself and the floor.

"Oh!" She squeaked and looked up, her bun looking like the top of a mountain, "Oops!"

The flour was everywhere. On the floor, on her shoulders and shirt, and piled high on top of her bun to the point that when she moved, there was an avalanche down the back of her neck and onto her back. Tadashi began laughing as she blinked up at him from her position near the floor. He helped her up and continued laughing, eye dancing as he stared at her.

She pouted, leaning towards him, "Think it's so funny?" She said, then shook her head until flour had been flung everywhere, even sticking to the batter on the walls and counters, "Have some of this!" She kept shaking her head until there was a cloud of flour in the air, and then she stopped and looked at him.

Flour had settled into his hair now, and it was frosted a gray-white, making him look older. He looked down at his floured body, then shook his head, causing flour to rain from his hair onto his shirt. He glanced back at her, then reached into a pile of flour on the counter and flung it at her face.

Honey closed her eyes before the flour could hit her, then opened them after it had settled into her eyelashes and on her cheeks. She blinked up at him, some of the flour flaking off and sprinkling on the bits of her cheeks that were still exposed. Soon they were in an all-out flour war, grabbing handfuls of flour and flinging them across the room at each other, flicking handfuls into each other's faces, even going so far as Honey taking two huge handfuls and dropping them down the back of Tadashi's shirt.

When the timer rang out, they both jumped and stopped what they were doing.

"Oh my gosh," Honey said, looking around, "We've made a mess."

Tadashi laughed and nodded, flour dropping from his hair still, "We'll be cleaning this for days," he walked to the oven and put a mitt on, retrieving the single layer of the cake and closing the oven back up. He sat it on the counter and turned to her, "Should we finish that second layer?"

They both glanced at the bowl and knew instantly if they wanted to make a second layer, it would have to be in a new bowl. The bowl for the second layer was nearly overflowing with flour from their fight and had at some point been knocked over by one of their mad grasps for flour power. Batter was partially spilled—partially barricaded in by flour—on the counter and was slowly beginning to drain down the front of the cabinets.

"Maybe just one layer will do," he said after a moment.

Honey nodded and headed to the frosting station. She grabbed the cocoa powder, sugar, milk, butter, and vanilla extract before she began mixing them in the automatic mixer together. When the frosting had become thick and smooth, she turned to Tadashi and held up some on a small spoon, "Here, taste," she insisted, shoving the spoon at his face.

He looked at her, then gently leaned towards the spoon, licking the frosting off slowly, "It's really, really sweet," he commented after he'd let the taste roll over his mouth for a second. "And really strong with chocolate."

She nodded, "Well, Hiro's young, so I figured he'd like really sweet stuff," she shrugged, "If he doesn't I could change it, or if you don't," she turned to her bowl and started mixing. She suddenly felt Tadashi's presence behind her as his arm came around one side of her and took the bowl. She stiffened and waited as he reached past her.

"He'll love it," he said, taking the bowl and moving away from her to the other side of the room where the cake sat waiting for decorating.

They both quietly stood at the cake station, decorating with icing spatulas and sprinkles alternatively as they found the best way to make the cake look nice. When they were done, the cake was a little lopsided but looked nice considering the flour that lay in little snowy piles all around the kitchen and the batter that had created a small puddle on the floor now.

"Guess we should clean up," Tadashi said, heading to the sink to wash up.

Honey stood watching him for a minute, sighing softly. That's when she noticed the pile of flour by her feet and grinned wickedly. She grabbed two big handfuls of it while Tadashi was washing his face and crept up behind him, "Hey, Tadashi," she said in a sing-song voice.

He stood straight and turned, "Ye-"

She came at him from both sides, hands ready to release the flour in little bombs when he suddenly grabbed her arms and turned them towards her. When she released the flour, it was too late and her hands were already facing her own body. She squeaked loudly as the flour hit her in the face and some got in her mouth.

She opened her eyes and blinked the flour away, glaring at Tadashi who was now beside himself with laughter, nearly crumpled over the sink as she spat clouds of flour out of her mouth, "Not funny," she said in a half-pouting voice. She took her phone out and took a quick, pouty, selfie, then took one with the snow-white kitchen. "Proof that it's not my fault. I'm the victim here," she got up next to him so that their cheeks were nearly touching as she took a picture of her own stark white face next to his fresh, clean face, "Bully."

He took a washcloth out of the drawer by the sink and wet it down, "Come here," he said softly and lifted the cloth to her face, gently wiping the flour from her face until all that remained was what was in her eyelashes. His eyes traveled her face alongside his wash cloth as he wiped the powder away, surveying her tan skin as it shone in the kitchen lights. He really hadn't seen Honey this close up before, so it was an entirely new look at her he was getting here.

Honey, however, wasn't taking the time to rove his face with her eyes, instead she was just watching his eyes intently, noticing how they shimmered in the light as though he was constantly on the verge of tears, but not sad ones. Happy ones. Always happy ones.

At some point, they both noticed that Tadashi's hand had stopped moving and now he held her face between one thumb under her chin and the hand with the washcloth on the edge of her hairline and her cheek. They met eyes once, twice, three times before slowly inching forward until their noses nearly touched.

"Tadashi," Honey whispered softly, leaning close, closing her eyes. She could feel his breath on her lips now and put her arms up on his shoulders.

Tadashi closed his eyes, leaning closer to her and could nearly feel her lips on his when the door to the cafe opened and the bells jingled, then slammed shut and he could hear Aunt Cass talking into her phone as he quickly stepped away from Honey, tossing the washcloth behind him into the sink. He cleared his throat and escaped to the maintenance closet to grab a mop and broom so he could clean up the mess. When he came back, Honey was wiping down the counters and they were mostly clean already when he began mopping.

By the time Aunt Cass got off the phone and came to the kitchen, the only things left to do were the dishes and sweep some of the dust off the counter into a trashcan. Tadashi showed her the cake and explained how Honey helped, then asked about the party supplies.

"I got a banner specially made for him, some balloons, picked up a few of those tool kits he's been wanting, you know the one with the iron or the solder or whatever it was, you know, for his robots."

"Oh, oh yeah. Are they wrapped?"

"Well, I was hoping you could do that, and maybe Honey Lemon if she'd like to since the party is soon and there's no point going home if she's going to be right back, right?" Aunt Cass eyed them both in a way that Tadashi could tell meant she knew something had happened and she even gave him an extra hard stare for it.

"Uh, well," Honey began but was cut off when Tadashi spoke up.

"We'd love to wrap those for you, Aunt Cass," he took the bags with the gifts in them and made his way upstairs. Honey stood around awkwardly for only a few moments before she wasn't far behind him with the wrapping paper and bows Aunt Cass had picked up.

"Leave the door open!" they heard her shout as they went up, instantly causing tension between them as they reached the bedroom.

Tadashi sat the stuff on Hiro's bed—silently thanking Wasabi and Fred for taking him out for the day—and quickly shut the screen around his half of the room before Honey got in the room.

Everything from then until the gifts were wrapped went off without a hitch and they managed to find conversation about their final exam projects and various class assignments until each and every present had been topped with a proper bow and tag. They even had time to wrap the gifts from him and one that Honey hadn't had a chance to wrap that's she'd had in her bag. With all said and done, they piled the gifts up and made their way downstairs, placing them on one table in the cafe.

"Well," Tadashi said, "We still have a half hour or so," he reached his hand behind his head and ruffled some flour out of his hair, "We could make a second layer still."

Walking back to the kitchen they joked around as they worked, taking selfies with the finished half of the cake, each other, and at one point having another mini flour fight in which Tadashi ended up with a starfish-shaped handful of flour mashed over his nose and brow, and Honey ended up with two big hand prints of flour on each side of her face and a stripe of frosting down her nose; they both had plenty of flour in their hair to cause small clouds when they shook hard enough. They took selfies together like that and sent them back and forth to each others phones for a laugh.

Finishing the second cake layer, they let it sit for awhile as they finally did the dishes and cleaned up the rest of the kitchen, then frosted it with the leftover frosting, spelling out Hiro's name in candy sprinkles, and moving it to the center-most table in the cafe just as Fred and Go Go came in.

They all got ready for Wasabi to bring Hiro in, then shouted, "SURPRISE!" when he came in the door.

Cake eaten, presents open, and Hiro passed out in a sugar coma on the couch from the robot-shaped pinata Aunt Cass had decided Hiro wasn't quite too old for, Tadashi and his friends went upstairs to the bedroom and sat around talking until one-by-one they all began to leave for the night. At some point, Hiro woke up and came up to go straight back to bed when it was just Tadashi, Wasabi, and Honey left. Wasabi, unwilling to be the cause of Hiro waking up again, said his goodbyes and left, leaving the duo sitting on Tadashi's bed talking about their projects again.

It was nearly midnight when Aunt Cass came up and said it was about time Honey went home.

"We wouldn't want her parents to worry, now would we?" She said with another knowing glance in Tadashi's direction, "Show her out and then to bed with you, too."

Tadashi got up after she left and showed Honey downstairs to the door. They stood outside on the stoop talking for awhile about this and that when finally Honey said,

"Well, it's late, I think I'm going to head home. One more for the road?" She held her phone up. When the others had been over, they'd spent a lot of their time together taking selfies, and there was no telling how many she'd gotten during the party. She had some, he knew, of Hiro opening her gifts, some of her with her cake, her chance at the pinata, she and Go Go eating cake and hanging out together, and even some of herself with Aunt Cass and Mochi. He was surprised there was still room on her phone, but, knowing Honey, she probably had something she uploaded her photos to so she could delete them from her phone with no worries.

"On for the road," he said.

She stood on the step in front of him, slightly to the side of him, so she was shorter by a good degree and he could put his arm around her in a half-hug gesture. She lifted the camera over her head for a decent high angle shot, then pressed the button. Just before it snapped, she turned and kissed his cheek.

Except, Tadashi had had the same idea and instead of kissing each others cheeks, their lips were touching.

They both froze for a second, then melted into the kiss as though they'd done it before. Honey got one more shot in from above before her arm dropped to her side and slid the phone into her pocket. She laced her arms around Tadashi's neck and felt his arms come around her waist, lifting her slightly off the ground. She lifted her legs behind her, crossing her ankles, and giggled as they pulled apart and he put her down.

They stared at each other for a moment in the faint moonlight, then kissed again, this time for longer with no flourish, just pure affection as they kissed chastely on the front steps. Tadashi kept his arms around her for as long as he could until she pulled away, smiling at him,

"Okay, I really need to go," she stepped away, "But, uh, I'll text you. Tomorrow. I'll text you tomorrow." She tucked some of the hair that had slowly been escaping from her bun all day behind her ear and waved at him as she walked away, "Goodnight," she said softly.

"Goodnight," Tadashi said in a slightly goofy daze, smiling as she left. He wandered inside and upstairs, flopping down on his bed and staring at the ceiling.

"Goodnight, Tadashi," he heard Aunt Cass say as she passed by the room and turned the lights out, "Next time just kiss her regardless of who walks in and you won't spend twenty minutes making a public display on the steps of my cafe."

"_Goodnight_,_ Aunt Cass!_"

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><p>Came out less satisfying than I was hoping for, and definitely much-less well-written than I hoped. I'm out of practice for writing romance, so this is my first step back into that end of the fanfiction pool.<p>

So

uh

yeah.

There's that.


End file.
